Adani’s ‘absolute failure’ revealed in court

Pam has been at the Daily Mercury since March 2013 and has also worked as a journalist in Batemans Bay and Wellington both in NSW. And yes, that does make her a Blues supporter. Growing up she moved around different places including Sydney, Moree, Wollongong and lived for about two years as a high school student on a small island in Micronesia called Pohnpei. Pam loves water sports, including SCUBA diving, snorkelling and kayaking but her awful balance means she’ll never touch a surf board. Ever...

ADANI left out a vital piece of information in its environmental assessment for the Carmichael Mine; the population of birds at the mine site is the largest population of the species left.

That is one of the main points an environmental group's lawyer argued when summing up the case against mining company Adani.

Closing submissions were heard at the Queensland Land Court yesterday in a five-week case between environmental group Coast and Country and Adani.

Saul Holt, representing Coast and Country, summed up his case in about four hours.

Adani's lawyer spoke for about one hour.Mr Holt said the proposed mine site was home to the world's largest population of the endangered black throated finch.

He also highlighted how Adani's environmental assessment had understated the population numbers and indicated there were no flocks of more than 50 birds.

Mr Holt said this was an "absolute failure" of Adani's four years of work on the mine site.Mr Holt said the most significant population of the vulnerable waxy cabbage palm was at the Carmichael Mine site.

But in his closing submissions, Peter Ambrose, representing Adani, said this wasn't the only place in the world where the palm and finch could be found.

He said the mine would not cause the extinction of the waxy cabbage palm and black throated finch.

"Both of those have substantial populations elsewhere," he said.

"We're not talking about this mining causing extinction of these species.

Mr Holt told Land Court judge Carmel MacDonald she was in a better position than any past decision makers to reject or approve Adani's Carmichael Mine because the case was the first time such a public, transparent and rigorous process had been undertaken.

Mr Holt expressed concerns the mine would dry up a wetland springs complex and how Adani "grossly overstated" the number of jobs the mine would create.

He said Adani claimed the mine would create more than 10,000 jobs but evidence given during the case showed the figure was closer to 1400.

Mr Ambrose criticised some of Coast and Country's witnesses, saying their evidence could not be relied on.

He said one witness, Associate Professor John Webb, who indicated there could be underground faults at the mine site, dressed up opinion as "pseudo-science".

Mr Ambrose said Mr Webb based his opinion that there could be faults at the Carmichael Mine site on the fact that one existed 5km away.

Mr Ambrose said some of the environmental group's witnesses were critical of Adani's processes but some did not provide evidence.